


Finding Our Way

by tsheps



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/F, Fluff and Smut, Making Love, Making Up, Thessia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-05
Updated: 2015-03-10
Packaged: 2018-03-16 11:40:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3486941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsheps/pseuds/tsheps
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Their relationship keeps finding endings.  Once from a death.  Once from Samantha Traynor.  Once from a moment neither could stop.<br/>They keep finding endings, but could the wreckage of Thessia and the inevitability of defeat finally help them find a new beginning?</p><p>A sequel to "What Was Lost Cannot Be Found" as requested by Persephone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I really had just seen Lost as a one shot. It was one of those stories that just popped into my head one day and I actually had the time to write it all down as it came to me. I hadn't thought of doing anything more, but then Persephone begged and I couldn't seem to stop thinking of a way to bring this Shepard and this Liara back together. Then I couldn't figure out if I wanted to go for fluff or smut, so I did a chapter of each just to keep everything equal. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Shepard ran from cover to cover, advancing as bullets whizzed overhead.  There were explosions all around her, and she silently praised herself for choosing to wear her helmet on this mission.  The molded Kevlar was padded enough to keep the concussion blasts from affecting her movements, and the sounds were muffled by the filtered earpieces.  It sounded as though the battle was raging at some distant point on the horizon rather than right in front of and all around her.  She could hear the chatter through her comm link better, as well.  Her confidence was suddenly much higher than it had been. 

Splinters of stone sprayed through the air a few yards in front of her.  A flash of blue flew through the haze and landed heavily behind a high wall.  She counted the gunshots to time her movements, and chose the exact moment of a lull to sprint out from behind the bench she had been crouched against.  She raised her Phaeston and released a torrent of covering fire before pausing and squeezing off several precise kill shots.  She never stopped marching forward as she fired, and was able to drop below the wall just as she spent her last round.  She took a moment to exchange thermal clips before stowing her rifle and focusing on the asari next to her.

Fear gripped at her, but her training was stronger.  She assessed injuries with as much cold detachment as she could muster.  Purple blood gushed from a half dozen jagged wounds.  Flesh was torn in a grotesque half smile from the right bicep.  The pale white of bone peeked from beneath a film of muscle so thin as to be nearly transparent.  A moderately large hole was drilled through the outer edge of the right thigh.  A smaller hole puckered the edge of the padded armor jacket above it, nearly at the hip.  Blood oozed from all of these wounds, a lot of blood, but at least it wasn't pumping out.  No major arteries had been severed there.

The chest was a different story.  Three separate areas of dark wetness distorted asari's abdomen.  They formed a perfect upside down triangle across the vital areas of her body.  A hole in the vicinity of her stomach looked like a second belly button.  The other pair crashed through the soft area at the top of her chest, just above the points of her breasts.  Blood pumped from them in waves.  The asari coughed wetly and a haze of tiny purple dots spread across the visor of her breather helmet.  She could not help it when her eyes tried to focus on those pinpricks of purple in front of her eyes.  They hung suspended on the clear plexiglass as if they were a constellation floating in the air in front of Shepard.

She pressed her gloved palms down hard over the two holes and the asari screamed in pain.  The scream died in a torrent of coughing and Shepard felt a gut wrenching pull at each glove as she tried to gulp a deep lung full of air.  Even through the muffling helmet she could hear the wheezing hiss of life escaping through those ruined organs.

"Hold on, I have medigel."

She thought back to the quarian she had spoken the same words to not long ago.  The tube stashed in the armored pocket on her thigh would not help her any more than it would have helped him.

"Help.... please.... I can't breathe..."

"It's okay.  Be calm."

The sounds of the battle around her broke in to her mind.  An explosion far behind them.  The clatter of a submachine gun followed by the whoosh of a sniper's bullet.  The crackling sound of biotics was omnipresent.  The flare of fires breaking out reflected in the angle of the visor in front of Shepard's eyes.  She couldn't figure out how to get to the medigel and still keep pressure on the worst of the wounds.  Maybe if she was quick, she could release one hand long enough?

"Mother?"

The voice was weaker, the eyes beginning to glass over.

"Stay with me.  Stay with me."

"Mother? Mother?  Is that you?"

The eyes focused on a spot over Shepard's shoulder.

"Hold me mother?"

The left arm, whole and untouched and mocking of the wasted flesh of her right, lifted up and gripped Shepard's shoulder.  The blue fingers were covered in purple blood.  They gripped so hard Shepard could feel the pressure through the hard casing of armor.

"Mother? Mother! Mommy?"

The eyes slid out of focus and the hand dropped, clunking sickly on the bent knee of Shepard's armor before falling to the ground, never to move again.  She took several deep breaths, staring wide eyed at the lifeless asari.  She pulled her hands away from the still chest very slowly.  The blood had started to dry around the edges of her gloves, the tacky liquid clung to the two fabrics it had been pressed into.  The jacket pulled away from the chest, stuck to Shepard's gloves for an instant before gravity took over and let the clothing rest.  Shepard let her hands fall into her lap, the blood-covered palms facing up.  She looked down at them and her eyes filled with tears.

"Shepard!"

Footsteps ran to her and skidded to a stop.  There was the pressure of a hand resting on her shoulder and panting breath. 

"Goddess..."

Shepard looked up into Liara's tear-streaked face.  Her gaze was fixed on the body of the dead asari.  It was one of millions that littered the surface of Thessia at the moment, but the two of them took a moment to mourn this one loss.  The looked at her and felt the loss of a species at hand.  Then they stood without a word and continued to the shuttle that would take them away from the Temple of Athame and their bitter disappointment.

 

*****

 

After speaking to Councilor Tevos and breaking up a fight between Liara and Javik, Shepard slumped to her cabin.  She was exhausted, mentally and physically.  It suffused every inch of her frame.  She wanted to sleep for a thousand years and wake up in someone else's life.  Someone who didn't have the weight of the galaxy on their shoulders.  Someone who didn't dream of children burning.  Someone who could be with the one she loved.  A normal human.  Someone.  Anyone.  Just not her.

Her cabin door hissed open and she was meant by the cold glow of the fish tank.  She had bought a VI to feed her fish after she had accidentally killed a few hundred from neglect.  They swam happily in their little bubble, oblivious to her pain or the galaxy's ruin.  The private terminal on her desk was dark and quiet.  The intercom next to it did not blink for the first time in so long she couldn't remember.  She sped through a shower and threw herself into her bed, praying that she could get a good night's sleep for once. 

She felt like she had barely closed her eyes when she peeled them back open again.  Her eyes were gummy with sleep, her face pressed into her pillow.  She raised her head off the pillow and looked over her shoulder.  Liara was standing at the top of the stairs, her hands crossed in front of her.  Shepard groaned and let her head fall back into the alluring comfort of foam and cotton.  

"What time is it?"

Liara's voice was clear and calm and carried none of the tiredness that she knew the asari must be feeling, "Late.  Or early.  It really depends on how you look at it."

"I'm a glass half full kinda girl."

"Then it is early.  You have six hours before you are due in the CIC."

"What's wrong?  Is there news from Earth?  Or the Citadel?"

"No.  Nothing.  I... thought we might talk."

Shepard rolled onto her back, her arms thrown out at her sides.  She opened her eyes and looked out through the sky lights in the ceiling.  The sheets were tangled around her waist.  The tank top she slept in bunched up, exposing her abdomen to the cold, recycled air, "Don't you mean you want to fuck and then run out on me again?"

Liara gripped her hands reflexively, "I'm... sorry about that, Shepard.  It was very wrong of me." 

Shepard grunted and rubbed her eyes with one hand, "I'm tired, Liara.  I don't know what you want from me."

Liara took a few steps into the room, descending the stairs. Into the darkness away from the glow of the fish tank, "I would like to talk."

Shepard let her arm flop down again and looked back through the sky lights.  She decided to watch the stars flicker past in order to delay the moment when she would have to look at the asari.  Because to look on her was to love her when it came to Liara.  Her defenses would fall and she would wrap the woman in her arms and then would stand by and get her heart torn out again because she had no protection against the all-encompassing love she felt.  A prickling of mixed shame and defeat filled her eyes, and she spoke before the tears distorted her voice, "Okay.  Let's talk.  I want to talk about why you won't come back to me."

"Shepard..."

"You love me as much as I love you.  I know that you do.  Why do you keep me at arm's reach?  Tell me."

"Fine.  The reason is that I watched you die." She moved further into the room and watched her feet as she spoke.  "I watched you die and I mourned you when it seemed that not even the unlimited resources of Cerberus and the indomitable will of Miranda Lawson could bring you back.  They did, of course, but I came to realize that I could not do it again.  I will live eight hundred years after your death, Shepard.  I decided mourning you a second time would be too painful."  
  
Shepard felt the foot of the bed sag as Liara sat down.  She still didn't look at her, instead she said, "And now?"  
  
"And now I have seen my people slaughtered and my world in flames.  I do not believe any of us will survive this war.  We will both die, so we may as well die together."  
  
Shepard finally lifted her head off the pillow, looking down the length of her body into those ice blue eyes, "Not exactly the romance I was looking for, Li."  
  
"Well," She said as she lay back, propping her head on her hand as she lay on her side.  She looked down at Shepard stretched beside her.  "It is what I have to give.  I'm a scientist, Shepard, an analyst.  I live in my head, not in my heart.  If it isn't enough for you, send me away now."  
  
Her body language belied the threat.  She placed her hand gingerly on Shepard's chest, feeling the steady beat of her heart beneath.  The commander knew she was telling the truth.  She had been in the asari's mind enough during the meld to see that she lacked the fiery emotional compass that was the guide in Shepard's life.  It hadn't occurred to her until now that she always assumed that the storm of feelings was hidden below the surface, waiting to be coaxed out.  The idea that Liara simply wasn't that kind of person hadn’t entered her mind for a moment.  Now she wondered whether she had fallen in love with the person she wanted Liara to be rather than the person she really was.  
  
She looked into those eyes and felt the ghost of the asari's soul as though a memory of the times they had made love.  She knew the answer to her fear.  She would always know, "I can't do that.  I can't send you away because I love you."  
  
Liara gave her a sad smile, "And it hurts too much to be apart."  
  
"Yes."  
  
Liara lay down with her head on Shepard's shoulder.  The strong arm wrapped around her and pulled her closer.  She breathed in the scent of the human and said, "But it hurts too much to be together."  
  
"Yes."  
  
Liara bent her knee and lay her leg across Shepard's thighs, "Now you understand my dilemma."  
  
Shepard chuckled darkly.  It felt to Liara like the rumbling of an earthquake through her muscles.  Shepard sounded half asleep when she said, "So then let's be together."  
  
Liara's eyelids were suddenly very heavy, "Not exactly the romance I was looking for."  
  
Shepard gave her a little squeeze as they both drifted off to sleep, "Well, it's what I have to give."


	2. Chapter 2

As she had almost every morning for the last several weeks, Shepard woke to sounds of screaming and the writhing of limbs caught in a nightmare. Only this time, the nightmare wasn’t hers. The screaming wasn’t burning at her throat. She opened her eyes, her body trying to drag itself from the confusion of interrupted sleep. Liara was crying out, her body twisting the sheets that covered them both. Shepard reached out, but her arm was knocked away. She reached out again and was able to wrap her muscular arms around the terrified asari. Liara whimpered and struggled for a moment and Shepard shushed her, murmuring comforting words and stroking her crest. Beads of sweat had formed on her temples and her upper lip.

Suddenly her eyes flew open and they were overflowing with terror. She gasped and looked at Shepard with confusion. Then her face crumpled and she buried it into Shepard’s shoulder. Her body shook with her sobs. She wrapped her arms around the human and they lay there for several long moments, awkwardly hugging while lying in the rumpled bed sheets. Liara continued to shake, and Shepard felt tears fall onto her bare shoulder.

“It’s okay, shhh, it was just a bad dream.”

Liara took a shuddering breath and gripped tighter, her fingers dug into Shepard’s shoulder blades. She cried harder, the pillowcase began to dampen near Shepard’s cheek. She placed a light kiss on Liara’s forehead and felt the blue body relax a fraction. She stroked Liara’s sweat drenched crest, her thumb trailing over her temple, applying light, soothing pressure. Liara relaxed more, the muscles in her arms and back releasing one by one. Shepard trailed her hand down to the dark folds at the back of Liara’s neck, tracing the groves and massaging gently. The blue body pressed forward, a sigh escaped her lips.

The part of Shepard’s brain that was connected neither to her heart nor her libido threw up several red flags, but the commander dodged them deftly and pressed her lips to the graceful tattoo over the brow ridge in front of her. Liara’s tears had stopped now, but her breathing was growing heavier. Her fingers fully relaxed, and they trailed down the commander’s back to the hem of her tank top. Shepard’s heart pounded incredibly loudly in her chest as the fingers slipped under the ribbed cotton and moved back up her side. They did not hesitate when they reached the swell of her breast. Instead, Liara’s hand gripped greedily at the flesh. Shepard’s body responded instantly, her nipple hardening with aching speed and a flood of warmth dropping into her belly.

Even though it was a terrible idea. Even though she was sure she’d be hurt again, ripped open when she was at her most vulnerable, Shepard had no choice. She pressed into the hand, her body demanding Liara’s touch the way her lungs demanded air. Her own hand dropped to the thigh that had slipped out from under the sheet, pulling it on top of her own. Liara’s body moved willingly, gratefully, as though the fact of Shepard’s touch was a gift she longed for but was afraid to request. She lifted her face, and Shepard’s mouth was on hers in an instant.

They kissed with a desperation borne of war and fear. They kissed to remember and to forget. Their tongues knew each other so well that they moved together without thought. Shepard shifted her body, moving on top of Liara, who opened herself freely. Shepard propped herself on one hand over Liara, not wanting to put her full weight on the slight body, but Liara pulled her down. She needed to feel the full weight of her lover on top of her. She needed to feel the gravity of their encounter, as if she may float away without the other body pinning her to this bed and this moment. Shepard reached out to slip her hand under Liara’s clothes and realized with a jolt that Liara was wearing her N7 hoodie. Though she could not remember what Liara had been wearing when she arrived last night, she was sure it had not been this. She must have gotten up to change at some point during the night.   She pulled at the zipper and the hoodie came open. Liara was not wearing anything underneath it. Something about the idea of Liara’s naked torso, her naked breasts, being wrapped in her own clothing made a groan form low in her throat.

She traced the lines of Liara’s abdomen with her hand before letting it slip blindly further down. Liara was wearing a pair of her boxers, too. Her core nearly exploded with arousal. She slipped her hand under the waistband of the familiar fabric. Liara gasped into her mouth as her fingers slid through the wetness pooled between her thighs.

“Shepard…”

“Oh Li…”

Liara’s hands slid under her tank top at both sides and pulled the shirt over her head. Her short red hair, already tousled by sleep, fell in messy chunks in front of her eyes. She tried to shake it out of her way, unwilling to separate her hand from the heat of Liara’s azure. Blue fingers moved the locks, holding them back so Liara could look deep into her eyes. The whites of her eyes were swirling with black as Shepard’s fingers teased over her outer folds. Liara bit down on her bottom lip and sucked in her breath when Shepard’s finger slid over her clit. She twirled lazy circles, enjoying the pleasure that spread across Liara’s face as she teased. She bent down to kiss her neck, and Liara tilted her head to expose as much of the sensitive flesh as she could. Shepard licked from Liara’s collarbone to her jaw, then she suddenly bit down hard on the soft flesh and pushed two fingers roughly inside.

Liara gasped and bucked into the twin pleasurable pains, drawing both the fingers and the bite deeper. Shepard gently thrust a few more times, working a slow rhythm that Liara seemed to enjoy. Then she withdrew, sliding the fingers back up to her throbbing clit. Liara whimpered and growled, canting her hips, trying to get Shepard back inside of her. But now she was pressing harder into Liara’s clit, rubbing with firm, confident strokes. Liara took up this new sensation and let herself fall into it. She moaned and matched the movements, gently urging a faster pace occasionally. Liara started to pant, and she absently squeezed and rubbed Shepard’s nipple. The touch was starting to make her lose focus, so she moved to kiss Liara again, breaking the asari’s contact with her achingly hard nipple. Liara started to grind into Shepard’s hand, her breathing becoming jagged. Shepard stopped her rhythm and shot quickly back inside, this time with three fingers because Liara was so wet and swollen that two wouldn’t have been enough.

The penetration was so deliciously sweet that Liara’s mind wrapped around Shepard’s before she even realized she had reached out. The human had been purposefully open, waiting to accept the meld, wanting to show Liara her trust and love. Her orgasm was so sweet, so perfect, that Liara was completely silent when she drifted into ecstasy. She did not make a sound either in the meld or without, but the flood of joy and love that swept over the connection was enough to tell Shepard that she had achieved her goal. The fluttering of her inner walls around Shepard’s fingers was frantic, but the rest of her body merely released. Her muscles had clenched ever so slightly in the buildup, but now the tension melted away so serenely that she might have drifted back to sleep. Her breathing was only slightly uneven on Shepard’s neck.

As the contractions around her fingers slowed and then stopped, Shepard withdrew as gently as she could. She pressed slightly on the still swollen clit to earn the last of her silent aftershocks, and then she lay contentedly on Liara’s smooth body. The asari’s eyes were still closed tight, and Shepard watched her with an adoration that made her chest ache. She loved Liara with every fiber of her being. She always would. She would run through a million miles of fire for this woman. She would take a hundred bullets. Walk naked through the glaciers of Noveria. She would do anything. Anything for one more glorious moment just to look up such a magnificent creature.

Just as her unseen reverie reached its most embarrassingly raw moment, Shepard realized that Liara had not retracted immediately from the meld as she usually did. She was still wrapped around Shepard’s mind with her own. All of Shepard’s pathetic romantic musings had been broadcast in their unedited glory directly to Liara. She blushed and closed her eyes.   A warm hand traced her burning cheek.

_There is nothing pathetic about you, Jane. I love you with all of my heart. I may not express it as often as I should, but I feel the same as you. I’m not a poet like Ashley, but just because I can’t say how I feel doesn’t mean I don’t feel it._

Shepard smiled and a tear slid down her cheek. She felt like her heart was tearing and knitting together at the same time. She was having a very hard time breathing. Liara wrapped her arm around her neck and drew her into a gentle kiss. She maintained the meld, so Shepard could share the intensity of joy that Liara felt at the simple press of her lips. She felt an odd but gentle pressure in her mind that she was sure meant Liara wanted to switch positions with her. She had no idea how she knew, since Liara had never maintained a meld this long with her or used it to communicate her desires. Still, it seemed the right thing to do, and when she shifted her body the pressure evaporated, proving her correct.

Liara nestled her body on top of Shepard’s, slipping her thigh into the wetness between her legs. She moved with a grace and gentleness that defied the occasional coldness of her personality. She rocked into Shepard slowly at first, building an anticipation. Shepard let her set the pace. Instead of rushing towards her own orgasm, she allowed Liara to take charge. Allowed Liara to give rather than trying to take what she needed. With a mental caress, the asari expressed her gratitude. She showed Shepard how much it meant to her to be able to please her lover. Let her taste the confidence it gave her. While lost in the sensations Liara was feeling, Shepard was building towards release. When it crashed into her, she moaned as much in surprise as in pleasure. It was both slow and sudden, and she was shocked to find Liara had crested with her. They came down off of their shared orgasm with a shiver.

When she had recovered, instead of laying down next to Shepard, Liara straddled her hips and sat, their pelvises just touching. She was still wearing the hoodie but she had slipped both of them out of their underwear when she flipped Shepard over. Their sex warmed skin met only at their thighs. Shepard smiled up at Liara, who smiled back. She released the meld, but this time did it with a mental caress and something that felt to Shepard almost like a kiss. It was a removal that showed without question how little the two parties wanted to part. They stayed like that for a long time, looking into each other’s eyes. They found that they had both had moved towards each other’s needs enough to have bridged the gap in their relationship without either fully giving in to the other. Without negotiation they had reached compromise.

 

The door to the cabin hissed open and firm steps echoed on the rubberized floor. A tragically familiar voice called out, “Commander, I’ve come across some information on a Cerberus communications…”

Samantha looked up as she walked into the room. Shepard and Liara were frozen in position, both of their faces turned to look at her with mixed horror and annoyance. Samantha stopped moving, one foot actually suspended in air. From her vantage point, she could see the N7 logo on the hoodie Liara wore. She could see the pert, blue breasts peeking out from behind the open zipper. She saw Shepard’s hands resting on the bare thighs wrapped around her hips. She could see Shepard’s nakedness and the way their bodies joined in a very intimate spot.

“Jesus. Fucking. Christ.” She slammed the datapad she had been holding to the ground. To her intense disappointment it did not shatter or even crack. “This is not fucking happening! Not again! I have been working up the nerve to come up here for days, and here you two are bloody shagging again! Do you simply wait for me to set off for this floor before the two of you start fucking?”

It seemed that neither of them could come up with any way to respond to this, so Traynor continued, “I realize that what we had meant nothing to you, but you could at least show a little bloody damn respect! Can’t you use the bloody fucking privacy lock on the buggering elevator?!”

She turned on her heel and stormed out of the room, angry tears spilling down her cheeks. Liara hunched her shoulders and dropped her gaze to where she was balancing herself, her hands pressed to Shepard’s prominent hipbones. Shepard recognized the confusion and shame in those eyes and her mood darkened. She gathered up the armor she had so very recently shed from around her heart and tried to piece it back in place. There were gaps and weaknesses that had been formed by the intimacy of their lovemaking. If those defenses were to be truly tested, her heart would be shattered in an instant, her hope and will would leak away like rainwater over concrete.

“Are you going to run away now?”

Shepard was embarrassed at how weak her voice sounded, but really it was a miracle she had been able to speak the question at all.

Liara looked up at her and blinked, staring at her in that cold, appraising way that she had. It left Shepard feeling exposed and raw. She swallowed hard, waiting for the answer but hoping it would never come. Liara moved off of her suddenly, swinging one leg over her and releasing her hips. Shepard held her breath, the pain of what she knew would come so real.

Liara lay down next to her and pulled the sheet over the two of them. She nestled in close and closed her eyes. There was not a trace of doubt in her voice when she said, matter-of-factly, “No.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Traynor- not sure why I felt the need to torture her so much in these two fics. Oh well, I've decided to make it up to her in my other work 'Long Day's Journey Into Night'.
> 
> Anyway, this is it! Hope you enjoyed. I had a lot of fun with this version of Shep and Liara. I'm glad that I was persuaded to write more and give them a happy ending.


End file.
